Beyond the Pale
by EmbleerFrith0323
Summary: THIS FIC HAS MOVED. You can find it here! You can find on Archive of Our Own, under u/n Embleer Frith0323. Sorry, I have trouble navigating this site!
1. Then You Shall Hearthe Surly Sullen Bell

_No one really knows who they are, or why they came. They are called the Horsemen. They arrived in a deranged mockery of Biblical fashion—the proverbial thieves in the night. In a wash of blood, fire, and death, they came, and were just as quickly gone._

 _The Month of the Devil. It was a sustained, pulsing blur of cities vaporized into dust, troops burned to cinders, Leaguers shattered like Matryoshka dolls when they moved to resist. Nuclear weapons detonating in retaliation, dropping the bleak, heather curtain of suspended animation over the thick, stifled earth. And now, none is above the grasping, skeleton claws of this dead world. There is no life. There is no immortality. There are no cheats. The al Ghuls were slaughtered for their Lazarus Pits, their heads tacked on pikes like gruesome pins on a bare, dusty cushion outside the crumbled ruins of their stronghold. Within weeks any users of the pools met the same death at the hands of the Purge, who bombed the pits into steam. This is our punishment, they said. It's the best we deserve._

Cold.

Always the dank, chattering, bone-penetrating chill.

The sallow, graying noon hangs filmy overhead, the rag of smog stretched like filthy cheesecloth over the muddled sun. Even curled against Wolf, I shiver in tectonic quakes that set my teeth to mimicking the quick-fire din of applause. The boy fares little better, balled up quivering into the concavity of my abdomen like a tartan-wrapped pill bug. I draw in a stifled breath through the scarf tied over my mouth and nostrils. There are two scarves, one for each of us, both enchanted against what soot there still is in the air.

There's a seeking in my abdominals, a sense of roving and shifting. Empty and clawing and weak, sending the accustomed wobbliness through my limbs. I've been dizzy with fatigue and undernourishment for weeks now. Today will be hard going if we don't find food. It will be hard going until then, too.

Exhausted to the marrow, part of me wants to return to sleep (and dreams), but I'm not quite ready to quit life yet, however poor a pass I might make at it these days.

"Come on," I murmur, waking the boy. "It's time to pack up."

He shivers. "I'm really tired, Dad."

"I know."

"And I'm cold."

"I know. But if we stay here, we'll only stay cold. At least moving around we'll be warmer."

"Five more minutes?"

"…Okay. Five more minutes."

"Thanks."

"Sure."

I lay a hand on his head, working my fingers in the messy, heavy tufts of thick, jet black hair that he's inherited from both parents. If not for the continued, brackish rain that's given it a good drenching since last night, it would be unspeakably scuzzy. He needs a haircut. I'm not good at those.

"I think I'm ready to get up now," he says, by and by.

"All right," I say, and try to will my aching muscles into motion. Wolf rises, stretches, and then sits next to the boy.

"Are we going to walk all day again?" he asks.

"Probably. Sorry."

"…It's okay."

"We'll be there soon. Promise."

"Where your friends are?"

"Yep, that's right."

"Dad, how many friends do you have?"

"I used to have a lot," I say. "Come on, let's get up."

Getting a fire going in the rain is a pain in my ass. I have to wrangle the tarp into submission, no easy feat in the determined wind, until eventually, I launch full-scale war on it. By the time I've finally gotten a small flame sparked in the small, portable stove we carry, I'm cursing a blue streak and overtly grumpy. The boy, unfazed, hatches some doodles in the mud with a stick. One night, we had thrown his sketchbook into the fire, one sheet at a time, to keep it burning. I had to fight tears, watching his drawings torched.

I sift through the regrettably lightweight knapsack, assessing what little food stores we have left. I feel like a total heel every time I see the fruit—I pinched those goods from one of the Light's greenhouses. I try to remind myself of Bart's words regarding scavenger rights. Finder's keepers and all that. When we came across the conservatory, I was still good for another day or two, but the kid was in bad shape, and needed to eat as in yesterday. Desperate, I left my son with Wolf, and broke in to raid that place like a lion on a field day in a sheep pen. I didn't feel all that bad, not at first, when I saw the look on my son's face as I showed him the plunder, and watched him as he happily plowed through the armfuls of fruit I brought out for him. But the guilt assaulted me later, _really_ hard, enough that I even dwelled on returning the remainder of the booty to the greenhouse. I knew we were past that point, though, and at least my son slept more deeply and comfortably that night. I haven't touched a fragment of the fruit since.

A can of tuna, a cup of instant noodles, a container of pork and beans, and the remaining fruit is all we have left. We ran out of bottled water. I gnaw my lip, which is already chapped and chewed to shreds. We'll need food, but we don't have any credits left, and panhandling unsuspecting strangers leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. However, there's just no promise of well-gotten gain these days; at least, not for Sams.

Shortened from "Samaritans." It's what heroes are called now. It's not a good thing.

"Acid rain instant noodles," I mutter. "I do not like them, Sam I am. I am Sam, Sam I am, Sam on the lam, I am, I am…"

I crack up, and then think I might finally be losing it as I run rainwater into a cup through a filtering cloth. It's a slow, tedious, boring process, but after a time, we have a full cup of reasonably clean water. I remove the cloth and inspect the damage. Almost completely gray, black in places. I expel a breath. The boy has sat, resting his back against Wolf's form, watching this whole while.

"So we definitely can't drink the rain water without using the cloths," he states.

"Yep, that's right," I tell him, setting the water in a pan over the fire. I hand him an apple, then grab another cloth and set to filtering more rain as the cup heats. "You know, we couldn't do even this a few years ago. Levels of contaminants were way too high to be safe even after running the water through a filter. We'd have to sit here and boil it."

He pulls the scarf from his face. "And then we'd really be in for it because we can't stay in one place for too long."

"Yeah. And then before those contaminants, things were pretty radioactive still."

The boy makes a slashing motion across his throat. "Yep, and if we drank that, it'd be curtains."

"That's right," I mutter absently.

"That's why the water rations were so low for such a long time, even with it constantly raining and snowing and stuff."

I smile at him. "You're a smart cookie, you know that?"

He looks up at me, and startlingly resembles his mother in the pallid light. "Did I get that from you?"

I shrug. "Maybe. Your mom was smart, too."

" _Am_ I like Mom?"

"Dead ringer."

"I thought everyone said I looked like you."

"Well," I tell him, "you do, but…"

I don't want to talk about this anymore. However, he looks at me expectantly.

"But what?" he prompts.

"I see pieces of her in you all the time," I say, as lightly as I can.

He smiles.

Yep. Dead ringer.

"I miss her," he states, pressing at the mud under his foot with his shoe.

I'm silent a moment, and then say, "Yeah. Me, too, kiddo."

The water is boiling. I prepare the instant noodles, oddly reminded of college. I hand the cup to the boy. He spoons some into his mouth, and gives a few handfuls to Wolf. After a few minutes of eating, he extends the noodles to me.

"Here, Dad," he says. "You should probably have some, too."

I shake my head. "I'll pick off whatever you don't finish."

He ponders the noodles, and then holds the cup back out. "No, go ahead."

He's right that I shouldn't go without. I eat, and try to remember to pace myself. I don't want to finish what's left in the cup without letting my son have the rest, but he and Wolf have polished off about three-quarters of its contents, and if I don't at least make some effort to keep my own strength up, I'll run every risk of going the same route as his mother, and he'll be left only with Wolf in this hostile place. Smart kid or no, that thought rots my gut.

We wrap up, and I tell the boy to put his scarf back on. Even with the significantly lower levels of ash, soot, and other pollutants in the air now, it's best to err on the side of caution. I draw my own scarf up over my nose, pack up our meager belongings, and we set out, heading west.

 _Savage enjoyed a meteoric rise to power, only we're still waiting for the equally meteoric fall that should follow._

 _Captain Atom absorbed such a vast quantity of fallout from the nuclear retaliation that he disappeared. Just transmutated into oxygen. Presumably to an unfathomably distant future, but there's no way to really tell._

 _The Light laid claim to that act of tremendous altruism. Their assertions falsely backed by fallacious documents and evidence. They were championed as Earth's greatest heroes in the wake of the Justice League's failure to protect the earth from the Horsemen, a flop that forced leaders the world over to turn to their nuclear arsenals and lay waste to the planet in a sweeping of fire and ash. Previous indiscretions of the Light, all apparently forgotten. All swept under the rug without a speck remaining when Savage implicated that the otherworldly visitation was a response to some botched League mission, elsewhere in the universe, long since disremembered._

 _Unrest. Disputes. Skirmishes. Finally, war._

 _The League, its ranks sparse and resources depleted, unable to do much more than subsist beneath the onslaught of attacks. Militaries ill-equipped to do battle with the Light, decimated and shamed. Countless more in cahoots with our enemies. Our sympathizers and allies outnumbered, overpowered, and finally, defeated._

 _The US president was targeted and assassinated as a League supporter in short order thereafter. Savage seized the States before a thundering ovation. He was a savior, they said. Barbara and I sat in our apartment in Bludhaven, where we watched the broadcast of what would cost us our last shreds of real freedom on television. Her face was white in the pale glow of the television, her chest unmoving with her detained breath._

 _Within days, the words we feared._

 _"_ _All members of the Justice League, and its cooperative, Young Justice, including sympathizers of these terrorist cells, are to be handed over to the appropriate authorities with immediacy and extreme prejudice. Any assistance provided to known members and supporters will be regarded as an act of terrorism. All symbols, paraphernalia, terms, and names concomitant with any Justice League or Young Justice affiliates will be received as highly suspicious and subject to investigation. Failure to comply with these regulations will result in punishment to the fullest extent of the law."_

 _Of course, telling a Leaguer not to suit up is like telling a shark not to swim._

So weird, I think to myself, as I help my son navigate a rushing, black-water river on slick, silty rocks in the rapidly fading daylight. I never saw myself as a father, biological, adoptive or otherwise. A big brother, sure, but father, no. And yet, here I am, and here I've been.

Traversing the stream in the water, using it to etch our passage, is slow going and cold, but necessary. Marauders are preceded by genetically enhanced, flesh-eating hounds. It's thanks to countless lucky stars that their enhancements haven't enabled them to pick up scents in running water. It's a profoundly risky business. The rocks are randomly dispersed across the river, with plenty of deep, quick-flowing water between. The temperature is only dropping—the rain is steadily evolving into sleet. Bits of ice travel over the surface of the water. My hands are numb, the fingers tingling painfully and burning at the tips. My hair keeps trailing into my eyes. I'm shaking almost to the point of convulsing. I think it would be nice to feel my phalanges again. I can't remember the last time we slept in a house.

"Dad, check it out!" the boy calls, apparently impervious to the crap-ass weather, leaping blithely to the next stone. His balance is good, his arms outstretched and steady, his posture straight and confident. If things change, he'll likely surpass me as an acrobat. "Dad, watch!"

"I am. You're doing great, kiddo," I tell him, smiling.

Wolf is a skilled acrobat himself, hopping securely from one rock to the next. His legs and undercoat are sopping, but his shoulders and back are only dampened from the rain. Occasionally, he shakes out his coat.

It's a good ways from the shore, and too far from the next potential stepping stone, when I get a perch on the last viable rock. I try not to swear, even though it's not like it's anything the boy hasn't heard. The part of travelling in water, the part I've dreaded, has come.

The general idea is to make the Marauders believe that we tried to cross the stream via the outcroppings of rock, then got sucked into the current to drown, or that we crossed the river downstream. Either way, we have to end up a good ways down in order for either one of those to be a plausible ruse, and tonight we'll set up camp without having actually crossed the water.

I'll have to wade with the kid on my shoulders. We're already wet and cold, but not soaked through, thanks to some of the garb we have on. I'd rather none of us goes hypothermic today, but given the sleet and floating bits of ice, it looks like that's not in the cards. We'll also probably have to camp earlier than I'd like.

Damn.

"Well," I say. "Time to take a bath. You okay with riding on my shoulders?"

"You're really getting in the water? You'll catch your death of cold," he says.

I turn, and give him a smile. "Like I said. Pieces of your mom all the time."

"…Will you be okay?"

"Oh, yeah, I'll be good. It's not like Popsicles have feelings or anything."

He looks quizzically at me.

"Just means I'll be cold," I explain, recalling that he's never had or even heard of Popsicles. "But it'll be fine, we'll just have to find a good, dry-ish place to hunker down for the night so I can defrost."

He makes a face. "You're so weird, Dad."

"Well, that's a trait you've inherited, along with my devilish good looks and charm. Come on, better get moving."

I wait for him to jump to the rock I'm standing on, and Wolf hops to the stone he just leapt from. There's just enough room for me to kneel down, and the boy climbs atop my shoulders. There's no easing into water this cold, so I just plunge in up to my neck. The shock yanks the breath right out of me and about fences every motion for a spell, although the violent current breaks this brief halt. Wolf lowers himself into the river, and vigorously starts paddling. I can't seem to get my lungs working as I laboriously make my way downstream, every movement pulling strength I don't have from my limbs. By the time I hit the first footfall that doesn't flirt with dragging my head, and my son, under the water, I'm past the point of shaking—not good. My fingers, aside from the prickly numbness born of the chill, have fallen asleep, along with the entirety of my left arm and the right fore. My heart sputters in my chest, then slows to a sporadic thumping, then sputters again.

When we finally break off from the current to reach the shore, it's all I can do to keep focused on the task at hand. My brain has gone stupid, along with my digits, and I stare unseeing at the blackened sand for a second as my thoughts try to catch up with our surroundings. I tilt forward, unable to keep fully upright. Thankfully, my son is on top of things, drawing me into the thicket of evergreens maybe a hundred feet from the shore, Wolf following close.

"Dad? Dad, you okay?" he asks, plunking me onto my butt under the sparse conifers.

I don't really have the wherewithal to answer, just to resist the drowsy cold that threatens to draw me into the hinterland of sleep, a dimension I might not return from. I'm dimly aware of the boy speaking, but I'm having a hard time picking up on what he says. I sluggishly realize he's dragging my soaked clothes off, then wrapping me in a tolerably dry blanket, and then setting up the tarp. I watch with intense concentration, keeping myself in the here and now, as Wolf shakes out his fur, then rubs up against the tree trunks, drying his soaked, heavy coat.

My son gets a bit of spit going by speaking some words and lighting one of our precious starter logs (regrettable, but admittedly necessary right now), then coaxes my immobile arms from their locked positions to nudge my tingling hands into my armpits. Things I've done for him throughout these weeks in the wild, copied now. Through the shrinkwrap that the cold has stretched around my brain, I feel a detached, sick sliver of guilt that my ten-year-old has been forced into playing caretaker.

"Dad, come on," he says, urging me to move toward the small, orange flames that crackle and flicker in the wet, frigid air. "Get closer to the fire."

I acquiesce, and notice that he's shuffled out of his damp threads, and has burrowed up beneath the blanket, his arms wrapped around me like the belts of a lifejacket. Wolf, now reasonably shaken out, trots over and curls his vast, furry body around us both. After some moments spent like this, I start to quiver again, then chatter, and then feel that I can at last cajole my arms into returning my son's embrace. Finally, much warmer, I reach up and squeeze a handful of his damp hair.

"Thanks, kiddo," I mumble.

"You know, Dad—you promised you wouldn't scare me like that," he tells me. There's levity in his voice, but it doesn't fully mask the little eddies of fear that churn beneath.

"I know," I mutter. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay." He draws back a little. "Umm… can we eat? Did you want to?"

I shake my head. "You go ahead."

I regret that we won't be finding food, and that we're officially down to the barest stores, but the wade through the icy stream has left me bone-tired and too weak to move much beyond reclining and shivering. Against Wolf's haunches, I feel intoxicated lying in the heat from his body, and from the fire.

"Can I have the tuna?" asks the boy, rifling through the pack.

I nod. "You should have some of the fruit, too."

"We won't have much left, though…"

"It's okay. We'll turn something up tomorrow."

"Okay."

"Get a dry shirt on and make sure you brush your teeth."

"I will."

"With toothpaste. I'm serious."

"I know, I know."

I drop off before he's even ventured out from under the blanket.

When I wake for a moment, I register that his warm, small body is pressed against my chilled, tired one, and I encircle him with both arms. I rest my face against his hair, now dry, as the rain dribbles against the tarp overhead. Wolf sleeps to our backs, his side rising and falling in a lullaby-like rhythm. Everything I have in this world is under this tarp. The lowering fire still burns, fueled by the starter log and, to my regret, one of the boy's books resting atop, burning slowly through the hardbound cover. One of us should keep watch, but it's too cold and miserable even for Marauders to put in more than a few sniffs to find us. Bad weather, for all its dangers, at least renders one moot. Secure for now, I'm asleep again in seconds.

 _Sams, they call us. "Good" Samaritans. Bad people who have hidden behind their good deeds. The sparks of anger and fear fanned into flames that dwarfed the firestorms that ravaged the globe._

 _There might have been a time that posters of us hung in the bedrooms and lockers of teenyboppers and fans, that people stopped to have photos taken with us, or to request our autographs after pleading with us to share with them a few anecdotes. That time folded rapidly beneath the advent of the hot, bloody mistrust of our kind, until it was forgotten completely. As though it never even existed, outside of emphasizing our growing universal letdowns._

 _And then, the Marauders appeared. Groups of twisted brigands with a particularly fiery hatred, handpicked and fueled by commendation from Savage himself. They prowl the planet even now, their enhanced hounds as big as small horses and the breathing illustration of every childhood horror questing for the tiniest traces of us left behind, penning us in hiding like rodents and reducing us to only the smallest and most secretive efforts to fight back in the wake of all of our blood they've shed._

 _Divide and conquer._

 _So far, it's a winning strategy._


	2. That I in Your Thoughts Would Be Forgot

_So much hatred. So much bloodlust. It was insatiable. Superman, attempting diplomacy, fooled and shot with a Kryptonite bullet, exposed to more Kryptonite, movements that wasted him into a sobbing creature completely defenseless in its pain. Wonder Woman overcome, bound, tortured beside him. Parts of this captured on live television, the discomfited news anchors looking on in mute horror._

 _Not a soul moved to assist them._

 _Then, they were dragged off, Superman never to be seen again._

I remember it. That night. All that happened. Everything that followed. It might as well have gone down five minutes ago.

Still. I suppose that, in their way, the horrific events led to the birth of my son. You know what they say about clouds and silver linings.

Roy and I, incarcerated and watching that terrible television broadcast from where we were held chained to a wall by the use of some strange computerized bindings, doubled our efforts to break free of our bonds. It was our captors' way of torturing us to leave us with the broadcast running in plain view.

Our squad had been caught when the Light's goons intercepted us on our own mission to free Diana and Clark. Their intricate knowledge of our plan of attack pointed to a betrayal from one of our own. We had no idea what happened to the rest of our squad, and equally, it wasn't looking good for our original quarry. To rescue our allies was first. But then, to find the right hand of the devil. Our ties held fast, until Roy and I both were soaked in the sweat of the effort spent straining against them. No amount of escape artistry presented any shade of real use.

When I figured the crowd would enjoy our livers with some farva beans and a nice Chianti, Barbara, M'gann, and Conner, all in civvies, along with Wolf, dared the odds to battle for our freedom.

"I think I speak for both of us," I stated as Barbara, with remarkable efficiency, shut down the systems that held us locked in place, "when I say I've never been so happy to see your faces."

My shackles were no sooner broken than the sound of a clap reverberated throughout the room, and Conner's head was morphed into a burst of viscera in a blaze of sickly green, a pink-and-bile mist left in its wake. A second clap, and Roy's neck snapped to the side, a vivid splash of red painting the stone wall beyond him. Neither Barbara, Wolf, nor I had even had the time to take a breath and utter a sound when a hurled incendiary hit the ground and burst next to M'gann. With a wail, she went up like a torch to burn to a crisp in under a minute's time. It all happened before I'd even registered that I was free to move. I never saw the assailants. I stood, stricken stupid for the barest second, covered in my friend's blood, brains, and skull fragments, then rushed uselessly to try to help M'gann as she screamed and thrashed and burned.

Whoever attacked them—knew who they were. Their weaknesses.

A bullet sliced my ear into ribbons of deaf, bleeding flesh, swiftly followed by another round that struck my arm. I spun and upended over a pile of computer parts and discarded tech into a hallway. Stumbling dazed to my feet, I sought, but couldn't see Barbara. A final round snapped my calf right out from underneath me and brought me jarringly to the slick floor. The world swirled down a guttering, black drain as the astounding reports of more gunfire rang out and decimated the hearing in my remaining ear.

Failed deus ex machina.

An indeterminate darkness followed, intermittently broken up by lurid dreams and voices echoing weirdly in and out of my skull. I awoke with a start in well-known surroundings—the med-lab in the Bat Cave. I tried to sit up, but lost hold of my breath, and went prone with a muted thump. The pain was transporting—I'm convinced I astralprojected to cope with it.

"Ah, Master Richard, back from the dead," spoke a blessedly familiar voice a few minutes of suffering later, "looks like we're running a bit low on our Demerol dosage… Open up, there's a good lad."

"What happened," I murmured hoarsely, once I had swallowed the tablet Alfred gave me. A cannula was pressed into my nostrils, and upon investigating, I spied a long, thick tube that wound out of the side of my bare chest. "How… How did I get here?"

"Well, a very large, furry companion of yours—Wolf, I believe, Master Bruce, Master Tim…" said Alfred, his voice muffled, wavering through a cotton tube. I turned my head toward him, straining to hear him. "And an old friend. Master Jason."

"…Barbara?"

Alfred was silent, his lips drawn into a thin line.

I shook my head as my heart fell out of my chest through my back. "Alfred…?"

"I am sorry, Master Richard."

I turned my face away, and didn't even bother trying to stem the tears. Alfred sat down on the edge of the bed, and rested a hand on my hair.

"For what it's worth," said Alfred, "Master Bruce and the Commissioner did everything they could."

I just cried until I mercifully lost consciousness.

I was in and out for a while after that. I don't remember a whole lot, just that I nightmared incessantly until the livid dreams roiled into horrible phantasmagorias, seemingly tangible visions of terror and evil, remembered and illusory. I have wavering recollections of startling myself out of the strange, undulating not-sleep as I cried for my mother in my delirium. I think at another point I struck Bruce with a blow to the face, confusing him for some nasty hellspawn that had come to cart me off to the netherworld.

I came to after an interim of darkness, with a dryness in my mouth and a burning in my throat. I was chilled and nauseous. My head felt weighted and stony, with a dogged throbbing in my temples. The pain overall, however, seemed a bit less, my vision a little clearer. The room was dark, save for the light from the monitors. I drew in a breath, released it. One ear felt congested, like it was stuffed with cotton, stung and burned, and persistently rang with a metallic thrum. I don't think I could have heard an atom bomb go off through it. My other ear seemed okay, picking up on the sounds of the room tolerably well. I was still on oxygen, but the chest tube was gone. My right arm was in a sling.

"Welcome back."

I looked over in the direction of the voice that I knew very well, and didn't need two ears to recognize. Bruce stood beside me.

"You scared the hell out of us, by the way," he told me.

I looked questioningly at him as he laid a hand on my forehead, then, removing it, nodded as though satisfied.

"You had a serious fever for a couple of days," he explained. "Lymphangitis from one of the gunshot wounds. We'd left the bullet in your chest because we didn't want to risk any structural damage withdrawing it. We had to wait until Cross could get here to perform surgery, and given the fact that Zeta Tubes are offline, you were in a pretty bad way by the time he arrived."

"Did he take it out?"

Bruce nodded. "It was ugly. But I guess it was successful enough, and frankly, you're alive. So… we probably shouldn't complain. We'll have to check the range of motion in your arm when you've recovered a bit more—the bullet passed through your deltoid and lodged in the tissue near your lung. There was some damage to your ribs and your humerus was partially dissolved. So at this point, you're rebuilt in a few places with metal plates."

"Jeez," I muttered. "Pretty sure this wasn't what I had in mind when I said I wanted to be Wolverine when I grew up."

"Well, luckily, that was the worst of it. The shot you took to the leg was a perforating hit and the bullet didn't tumble, so it wasn't as damaging as it could have been, even though it really made a mess of your fibula on its way through. Speaking of more metal plates. You'll have to wear that cast for a while."

I looked down, and finally noticed that I did, in fact, wear a plaster cast on my elevated left leg.

"There wasn't a whole lot we could do for your ear," Bruce continued. "I'm sorry. Alfred and Pieter said you'll likely recover at least _some_ of the hearing in it over time—but it's slashed to hell. Not much in the way of a solution outside of some serious plastic surgery, which we really can't do for you just now."

I reached up, and grimaced when I felt at the ruination of my ear.

"But…" Bruce continued, "I guess you can always just wear your hair long. Not that much of a stretch for you, anyway."

I gave him a half-smile, which faded. The reality that hovered over me, clamoring to be acknowledged, was steadily making its descent into my senses.

"Dick," he said, noticing my expression, and sobering. "I'm sorry about Barbara. But I swear to you. I did try."

I looked up at him, and shook my head. "I know you did, Bruce."

A pause.

"…M-M'gann?" I asked. "Did she… Did she survive?"

He shook his head. "No."

"Am I the only one…?"

"No, you aren't. Wolf survived. So did Tim and Jason."

"They're okay?"

He nodded. "As for the rest… Raquel and her family have provided a sanctuary for Leaguers and members of Young Justice. Garfield, Bart, and Jaime are with them. Diana was rescued by the Amazons, and is safe in Themyscira, although their doors are closed to refugees. As for Kaldur and Artemis, they escaped their incarceration, and are with Virgil at his parents' home. None of them is seriously injured."

So the rest of my squad was all right. "Anyone else confirmed dead?"

"…No. But Superman, Wonder Girl, Lagoon Boy, and Aquaman are missing. Tim is en route to Dakota City to join with Kaldur in seeking the whereabouts of the missing Atlantians and Cassie. Icon is working to find Superman."

"Any word on who sold us out?"

"Gardner. I don't think anyone was overly surprised."

I said nothing.

The silence continued for a moment, and then Bruce heaved a sigh. "Well. I'll let you rest."

I awoke again sometime later, uncertain of the hour. More nightmares. I lay sweating, terrified in the darkness scarcely dispelled by the feeble glow of the equipment. I pulled the cannula from my nostrils, and forced myself to sit up. Despite the fact that my body rioted against every motion and the obstructive cast on my leg presented a substantial mobility issue, I made my arduous way out of bed, hopped around until I found a set of crutches, nabbed one of them, and hobbled into the manor. I couldn't use both, seeing as how one arm was all bound up and out of service.

Leaning on the crutch hurt the hell out of my uninjured shoulder, which seemed weird, since it was the opposite arm that was hurt. Movement, as such, was laborious and agonizingly slow. I got pretty pissy about that in short order.

I had no idea if anyone else had sought shelter here. I doubted Jason had stayed. I wasn't even sure how this place was still safe. But I was on edge, and pretty well spent on the neverending cavalcade of horrors that relentlessly marched across my vision both in sleeping and in waking. Walking through the manor was at least something of a change of scenery, even if nothing turned up in the way of company.

The vast mansion was drafty and dim—the rationed energy that had just been instated at that time didn't permit for extravagancies, particularly in a place that large. I had vaguely set out with the harmless intention of poking around the library, but I started to think that perhaps the idea was slightly ill advised. I was huffing and sweating and in terrible pain before I was barely down the first hallway. I leaned against the wall, and attempted to catch my breath.

I was about to make the somewhat better-informed decision to head back to the med-lab to pass out for a week or so when my good ear caught the sound of soft, familiar footfalls.

"Wolf," I said. "Holy shit."

He trotted in my direction, his heavy, snowy fur bouncing on his enormous haunches. I leaned forward the best I could, bracing my weight on my unhurt leg, and caught him around his big, hairy shoulders as he came up to greet me. His chimney sweep tail fanned back and forth.

"Kind of surprised you're so happy to see me, old pal," I said. "All things considered."

He gazed up at me with his calm eyes, not a trace of blame or reproach in his intelligent face. I ran a hand over his head.

"I'm sorry," I told him, and rested my cheek in the space between his triangular ears. I heaved a sigh, knowing that there was no truly saying sorry for something like this, and opted for silence instead of repeating myself.

It was bizarre, seeing him without Conner stuck to his side. A flash of my friend's face unfurled inside my mind's eye, and before I could pull the curtains on it, I, again, witnessed the awful image of that same face blasted into mist. I closed my eyes, scrunching them shut. I didn't want any more flash images. I dug a hand into my forehead, then looked at Wolf.

"Okay, then," I told him, forcing myself to smile through my pounding heart. "Time to get whelmed… You up for a walk?"

He wagged his tail more forcefully, and I nodded.

"All right," I said. "Just give me a couple of hours to get moving."

We made our tedious way down the hall, and then down two flights of stairs, hindered by my need to continually pause and rest. Wolf was patient, as I'd come to learn about him over the years. I liked animals very well, having grown up around them in the circus. Bruce kept a dog he named Ace, a behemoth German shepherd with a head the size of a basketball, that was still maybe a third Wolf's size. The circus animals aside, Ace was the only pet I ever had, and even then, he predominantly belonged to Bruce, since he did the majority of the training. I was the last person I'd ever have expected to inherit Wolf.

Coming to the landing, I fell on my butt atop the bottommost steps. Wolf lowered himself to have a seat next to me. We sat there a while, as I caught my breath. Sweat that steamed in the biting chill dribbled down my skin. I wondered if I needed to be concerned about the fact that I was shivering, in spite of the steaming sweat.

When I was about to stand up, I heard voices, even through my partial deafness. I perked up, interested.

They were coming from the parlor, and I rose to my feet to make my protracted way across the foyer with renewed determination.

"…Can't be too careful, sir." Alfred's voice.

"Agreed. We might want to strip-search him. Make sure he's not wired." Bruce's.

"You've got to be kidding me." I paused at that, almost a hundred and four percent sure that this last was Lex Luthor's. "I come here in good faith, offering you not only the deal of a lifetime, but a deal that will safeguard your interests—"

"Yeah, yeah, we get it, Lex. You've already self-aggrandized, no need to go on beating a dead horse, here." Jason's voice. So he _had_ stayed. "What I'm concerned about, you see, is that you haven't even bothered to provide us some details about this deal. Or, hell, even just the basic gist of it. Sorry, but 'safeguarding our interests' and 'deal of a lifetime' aren't enough to so much as pique my interest, let alone get me listening. I mean, everything you say kind of translates to 'I'm Lex Luthor and I'm a scumbag,' at least in _my_ mind. Capisce?"

"If I am a scumbag, _Red Hood_ , then you are a completely irredeemable degenerate," Luthor returned evenly.

"Takes one to know one. So I'll tell you this—from one scumbag to another. We _just_ can't be sure you're not wearing a wire." There was a disquieting clicking sound. "Like you yourself said, times are tough. And like Alfred said, can't be too careful. And as we all know, you're with the Light." There was a moment of baited quiet, and I wondered if I should enter and put my two cents in. I stayed where I was. "Better let us frisk you, then, I guess, right? I mean… You'd do the same, in our position."

"All right, then," said Luthor. "Since you apparently can't take my word for it, frisk me, if it satisfies you, although I assure you that you will find nothing."

Some unidentified sounds came from the parlor.

"…Oh, for God's sake," muttered Luthor a few moments later. "There _is_ a lady present."

"Who, you seem to think, has never seen a man frisked before, or done her own share of frisking, Luthor." I instantly recognized that voice, and smiled. Zatanna.

Some more moments passed.

"Clean," Bruce announced.

"Well, then," said Lex, "now that we I know I am _not_ wired, just as I said—"

"One more thing," Zatanna cut him off. _"Yrcs."_

There was a moment of silence.

"He's also clean of any magical piggybacking," she determined.

I inched closer to the parlor, Wolf at my side.

" _Good_ , then," Lex says, his voice finally becoming terse. "As I was about to say—"

"Sorry to interrupt," I wheezed, limping into the parlor. "But I want to hear this."

"Master Richard, if you could find it in your heart to cease and desist stopping mine, I would be most obliged," Alfred snapped, moving to come up beside me.

"Sorry," I puffed, feeling dizzy. Wolf braced himself against my side, and Alfred took my arm.

"Dick, you shouldn't even be sitting up," Bruce berated me from where he stood. "You're damn far off from healing and you're still running a fever. Not to mention—"

"I feel fine," I insisted, a lot more crossly than I intended. "I'm standing, aren't I?"

"Alfred," said Bruce, his voice a low, level growl, "take him back to bed, and make sure he stays there."

"Very well, then, sir," said Alfred. "Come now, Master Dick, there's a good lad."

I was _not_ a good lad, and stood fast, wobbling on the crutch. "No. Like I said, I want to hear this."

I saw that Zatanna was gazing at me with concern, although her expression wore some confusion, as well. Jason was making a face that wavered somewhere between amusement and embarrassment.

"Dick," he said. "…Have you noticed that you're only wearing your underwear?"

I looked down, and saw that I was only wearing a pair of dark red briefs. Whoops. My head throbbed, and the lights in the room seemed to ebb and dazzle with each pulse. I had completely missed that I wasn't wearing any pants.

"I'm still listening," I said stubbornly, and fell into the nearest seat with a thump. The crutch clattered spectacularly to the floor. Wolf watched it fall, looked over at me, and then sat, his eyes trained on my face. One ear lowered slightly.

Bruce glared at me. "Dick, go back to the lab. Now. You need to rest. Go."

"No."

"With all due respect, Mr. Wayne," Lex said irritably, "I lack the time necessary to stand here while you argue with your clearly incapacitated ward. If we could please get to the business at hand."

"Fine," Bruce said, and if looks could kill, I wouldn't be here right now. "What's this deal you've come to propose?"

"Well, let me ask you something, Mr. Wayne—Batman," said Lex. "How is it that you think you've been safe for all this time from the Marauders and my associates?"

"I should imagine it's the opportunity presented by the tools Wayne Tech will have produced by this time next year to clean the ash out of the stratosphere in a markedly faster time frame," Bruce replied. "And they need me to supply the tech, given that it's my design and my company. The opportunity to have me targeted with the most convenience simply hasn't presented itself."

"Hardly," said Lex. "Why not kill you and just take the tech? Or take over the company?"

"I have failsafes in place should they try it," said Bruce without so much as blinking. "And they will. Give it time."

"Of course they will," Lex said, his tone sticky with condescension. Bruce remained unperturbed. "But… Why not yet?"

Bruce's face was impassive. "What are you trying to say, Lex? That you had a hand in their immobility? That you've been protecting my interests from the Light?"

"Yes," said Lex. "That's exactly what I'm saying, as unbelievable as it might be."

"Not unbelievable," said Bruce, pointedly lifting the "World's Greatest Detective" mug he owned and sipping from it. I found this to be hysterically funny and giggled myself to tears. My peals of laughter delayed any further attempts at conversation for a while.

Looking back, I really should have stayed in bed.

I got it together and wiped my watering eyes. "My bad. Continue."

Bruce didn't bother glancing in my direction, just worked his jaw and kept his attention on Luthor. "I had already deduced as much," he said. "I understand also that you've kept an active eye on the progress of the scrubbers intended to be merged with weather-seeding tools to encourage accelerated soot removal. I assume you're interested in procuring them for the Light."

"Not for the Light," Luthor explained. "For you."

Bruce frowned. "Explain."

"Savage is as interested as any in removing the ash from the stratosphere, a task which he has bestowed on me to accomplish," said Luthor. "However, even pressed, my own engineers have not been able to catch up to your progress." He paused. "You understand how this might be problematic. As such, it would benefit me to… _purchase_ Wayne Enterprises, along with its subsidiaries, in a conglomerate with Lex-Corp."

Bruce chuckled mirthlessly. "No."

"I figured you would refuse until all of the cards were on the table, and I have some arguably good ones to play," Lex said, rubbing his hands together. "In return for accepting my offer, you will continue to have total protection from all of the following—Marauders, enforcers, members of the Light, the League of Assassins, which, I'm sure you're interested in knowing, is still around, this new Purge organization should they prove threatening, and even civilian anti-Sam groups. You will be given access to larger rations in all areas—energy, water, supplies, and food, and your company will be under complete safeguarding by Lex-Corp. You will receive twenty percent of all revenue generated by Wayne Enterprises. I feel that this is more than fair."

I was about to cry bullshit, when Jason did it for me.

"That's horseshit," he snapped.

Close enough.

"I assure you," said Lex, "it's not."

"I'm sorry, but cui bono—who benefits?" Zatanna asked. "You're offering Bruce protection that he can't trust in return for saving your own skin from Savage. I'm failing to comprehend how that's supposed to be the deal of a lifetime. Not to mention the minor fact that you'll be pilfering eighty percent of the profits from his company."

"Which, I will gladly point out, isn't so profitable anymore, Miss Zatara," Lex said.

"All the more reason for him not to take such a drastic pay cut," I interjected. "Especially just to save your pitiful ass."

"Even delirious, he's right, you know. As my younger countrymen are fond of saying, you're takin' the piss, mate," Alfred said.

"I promise you that I am not," Lex insisted. "As we know, the enforcers and streets—and in particular the Marauders—are not kind to Sams."

"The streets are kinder to us than you think," Bruce said, with a loaded, false smile.

"They won't be once I opt to lift protection," Lex said. "When the Marauders and enforcers come down harder on this area, the fear will grow. And the good people of this city won't hesitate or bat an eye at turning any of you in."

"You're trying to say that with your protection, the Marauders won't canvas this area?" asked Jason.

"…Not quite. Although I'd like to, I can't keep Savage from sending Marauders to seek former Leaguers, their Young Justice affiliates, and sympathizers here. Only those that reside with you in this manor will be protected. I apologize that I cannot offer you more."

"And the only stipulation is that Master Bruce allows you to buy out his company to spare you from Savage?" asked Alfred. "Why not just ask to buy the tech itself?"

Lex assumed a look of eternal patience. "If I do not buy the entirety of the company, I cannot promise that the fate of 'Master Bruce's' employees at Wayne Enterprises—the only people _competent_ in this endeavor—will be merciful at the hands of Savage when he decides to take the technology by force. And then, have me killed for failing him." He looked hard at Bruce. "So you see, Mr. Wayne, it's not just the people in this room who are threatened and who stand to benefit from this deal. It's those innocent civilians working for you, building your scrubbers and weather-seeding tools."

"Like I said," Bruce murmured. "Failsafes."

"Which won't be enough," Luthor said. "I know your contingency plans already, Mr. Wayne. Fox explained them to me. They won't even make a dent in Savage's offensive."

A miserable silence stole over the room.

"Checkmate," Lex said silkily, leaning back in his chair with an air of benevolent triumph.

There was more silence, and Bruce stood. "Check," he said. "Checkmate, no. Hell will freeze over before you ever have _me_ in checkmate, Luthor. I'll consider the offer."

"Don't consider it for too long," Luthor said. "On both our heads be it if you fail to make a timely decision."

"…Alfred and Jason will see you out," Bruce said tersely, moving toward me.

When Luthor disappeared from the parlor with Jason and Alfred, I gave Bruce what I hoped was a hard look as he pulled me unceremoniously from the sofa and shoved the crutch roughly into my armpit. "You can't possibly be considering his offer, Bruce."

"There's merit to it," Bruce told me. "However, it _is_ Lex Luthor."

"Exactly, Bruce," Zatanna said, coming up beside me to help steady my uncertain stance. In my relief to see her alive and healthy, I abruptly hugged her with all my might. She, unflinching, returned the embrace for a good, long while. We both poured our hearts out in our collective thankfulness over the other's health until Bruce impatiently cleared his throat. We both glowered at him, but got a move on. "Anyway. Like we were saying," she continued. "It's _Lex Luthor._ The second you accept the buy-out, you accept him selling you out to the Light—"

"I'm aware of that, Zatanna," said Bruce. "My own plan is to find out when, exactly, he _plans_ on handing me over to Savage, and whether or not he plans to do the same with you and the others. Equally, I'd like to turn up what his plans for the company are."

"And from there?" I asked, wincing as a jolt of discomfort burst through my arm.

"Well, if he's true to his word, and it is, in fact, his own head on the block, I can guarantee that _he_ would sell out to _us_ quickly enough. That aside, if Savage isn't following through on possible earlier promises to share power with Luthor, you can bank on the latter becoming a turncoat full tilt."

"This is true," I conceded through clenched teeth.

"However, if this _is_ all merely a ploy intended to absorb Wayne Enterprises and appear to be the great hero of the Light that got the Batman _and_ provided the technology that will cut this nuclear winter in half, it's my full intention to determine his plan of action, and formulate a response," Bruce said. "You do not need to be worrying about that for the time being, however—you need to be worrying about resting up. The sooner you're back on your feet, the better, especially if the Light is mobilizing against us specifically."

"He's right, Dick," Zatanna said gently. Wolf chuffed his own agreement.

"I've been awake for an hour and a half at most and I'm already sick of being injured," I groused, then hissed as my leg hurt.

"You're also still pretty sick," stated Bruce. "Medicine is in shorter supply these days, so you _cannot_ push it like you used to. Keep your damn stubborn ass in bed."

"You know, there _is_ such a thing as restraint straps, Bruce," Zatanna said.

"Who told you I'm into that," I cracked, then giggled at my own wit. I then clenched my teeth at the spike in pain as we made our way into the Bat Cave.

"Dog," Zatanna muttered, chuckling.

She and Bruce assisted me into bed, with Wolf resting on a little pile of blankets on the floor beside, once we reached the med-lab. I swore at both of them for hurting the hell out of my injured leg as they boosted it into an elevated position, and then for forcing me to wear the cannula. I yelled at them for sticking me with an IV. Five seconds later I was spouting sonnets over how much I adored both of them and enucleating on my thanks to them for rescuing me. Zatanna gave Bruce a suffering look, and he, by the use of a syringe, put me under while I was still mid-sentence. From that point I was out for a good, long while, caught in the merciful barrens of a black silence.

 _Bruce, in the end, determined Lex to be telling the truth, and he accepted the offer._

 _In spite of our disbelief, over time, we learned that the protection had its advantages. Living a mimeo of our old lives comes to mind as one._

 _Heroism can be taken out of the world, but it can't exactly be taken out of the heroes themselves. Cheesy, but true._

" _Our aliases might need to be shelved for the time being," said Bruce, revealing the new, hooded uniforms that he and Alfred had put together, "but that doesn't mean the job has to be put up with them."_

" _The news yesterday said that the League was officially disbanded," said Zatanna, fingering a handful of the cowl that was to be hers. "Which I think could be considered misinformation beneficial to us, but… Marauders have actually been_ killing _non-League-affiliated vigilantes. In some of the worst ways imaginable, too." She paused. "…I guess that's an efficient enough way to try discouraging the League." She looked up, and a devilish look crossed her face. "But…"_

" _Let's make that difficult for them," said Bruce, with one of his rare smiles._

" _Difficult? Let's make it flat-out hell," Jason said._

 _So, once I healed up, we did._


	3. My Love Is As a Fever

_In Gotham, we were informally referred to as "Hoods."_

 _Given the nature of Savage's enforcers, and the reputation of the as yet unmet Marauders, our tactics on the streets had to be based on subterfuge, surprise, and speed._

 _Divert. Hit. Disappear._

 _Supplies were strictly rationed at stations in different sectors of the city, first come, first served. In response, black markets cropped up, ones we patronized, supported, and protected. We resurrected a facet of our former League duties by doling out food, any wide, ready supply of which was rapidly dwindling, to those who went without. Medicine. Clothing. Utilities. Clean water._

 _It's why we were called Hoods, apart from the less obvious reasons (the cowls, for one, the criminal disobedience, for another.) Because, rather like Robin Hood, we gave to the poor and needy, and deviled the heartless amassers of their lifeblood._

 _Our old teammates did the same where they resided._

 _The first night we saw the graffiti, the stylized "H" in spray paint scrawled across the crumbling flank of an abandoned building, we felt a shift in the world. That "H" tattooed across the slab of gray stone was the earliest, real sign that any hope existed amid the black pall of Savage's brutal rule—all of the raids by soldiers of the Light to weed out the weak, sick, injured, less fit. In Savage's words, to make up for the time the evolution of humanity lost due to the interference of the Justice League. The enigmatic Marauders destroying homes in their relentless search for concealed Leaguers, cutting down any protestors as they went. Savage himself gathering all non-League-affiliated metas to foster in his vague plans for the globe. And beyond. Doing God-knew-what behind his locked doors with them._

 _Naturally, the Hoods' symbol was outlawed in short order._

 _So, just as naturally, we left twice the amount of scrawled "H" symbols across the city._

 _And the Batman symbol._

 _The Nightwing symbol._

 _The Robin insignia._

 _Then Zatanna, wearing a look of satisfaction, took her wand, and with a flourish, hatched a "Z" across a wooden door, Zorro-style._

 _Divert. Hit. Disappear._

 _The taunting graffiti left as a defiant testament to our presence, in Gotham, and in all other cities our fellows called home._

"Enforcers came through here yesterday. Looking for your type."

I looked up at the nervous face of the young woman who stood at her door, her body half-in, half-out of the threshold, her jeans patched and dirty, her face unwashed, her long, wavy blonde hair hanging in unkempt wisps. In spite of the ravaged features that only come from witnessing true horror, she clearly was young—likely no older than in her early twenties, which would have put her at about my age. There was something familiar about her, although for the dim light and the grime on her face, I couldn't place how I might have known this girl. Given that most of my face was covered by one of the filtering masks that Alfred and Bruce had constructed to protect us from the rampant air pollution, I couldn't lay her flayed nerves to rest by attempting one of my "stupid-charming smiles" (a term Babs used once) at her, so I adopted the most disarming body language that I could instead, and, from where I knelt by Wolf's side, handed her a small bag of food and sundries.

"Good thing it's been a while since we last hit this sector, then," I told her.

"Shouldn't there be more of you?" she asked, concern overwriting her obvious disquiet.

"We've split off into two groups for the night," I explained, but for Jason's and Bruce's safety, didn't go into further detail.

"…They might come back," the woman said, her voice audibly shaking. "It'd be better for you to leave."

Zatanna nodded, handing her a folded pile of blankets wrapped in twine. "We'll be sure not to leave any traces of us having been here, other than the supplies. Have the enforcers been going through and checking your stores?"

"The enforcers aren't interested in stores," said the woman. "…Not yet, anyway. And I know you know the regional man's a sympathizer, so the supplies aren't a problem." She shook her head. "…It's you I'm worried about. We'd have all gone under a long time ago if not for your kindness."

Zatanna's eyes lightened in a smile half-hidden by her own mask, and shook her head when the woman took her hand, and squeezed her fingers. "Well. Please just be sure your extras are tucked safely away, just in case. Airtight if possible. And don't keep insignias in your home or nearby. You don't need to be worrying about us right now, just you and your own."

"Well, you're preaching to the choir there, hon," the girl said warmly. "And… right back at you. Just promise me you'll take care of yourselves."

Zatanna, again, squeezed her hand. "Of course. And you, too."

"H-how are you so brave through all of this?" the woman blurted suddenly, clinging to Zatanna's hand, as though she herself were a lifesaving floatation device thrown to her. "I just—I just don't know how you can stand up to them the way you do. Aren't you… aren't you _frightened_?"

Zatanna was quiet a moment, as though thinking.

"Of course we are," she replied, in time. "If we weren't afraid, I honestly don't think we'd be alive. But… whether we're frightened or not—" Here, she glanced back at me, her eyes crinkling into a broadened smile, "it's like a certain thirteen-year-old once told me—it's what we do."

The woman, finally, smiled a bit, bequeathing the expression to me, as well.

"Well. It really helps us feel braver than we might otherwise," she murmured. She gave Zatanna's hand a final press with her fingers. " _God_ , I'd love to do what you do. Give the enforcers what-for and all that."

"You're already doing it," I told her. "So just keep at it. Endure and survive, as the old tagline goes. Savage wants strong ones on his side, right?"

Zatanna nodded. "Survivors _against_ him will hurt him—bad."

The girl, heartened at last, reached over, and hugged Zatanna, and then me. Again—I was struck by a feeling of profound deja-vu.

"Thanks, you guys," she said, and retreated back inside her apartment.

After this gratifying exchange, perplexing though it was, at least on my end, we wrapped things up in the sector, and, maintaining cover and close watch, returned to the Bat Cave on foot by way of its entrance from the woods. It was bitterly cold and starting to sprinkle a gray, dirty sleet over the bare, clawing trees. By the time we made it back, each of us burst into the Bat Cave like ice-dusted abominable snowmen escaped from the Himalayas.

Shivering, I headed to a changing room, and shrugged out of the uniform with discomfort that went beyond the cold. My upper arm, leg, and chest still gave me a lot of pain at times, although I was mostly recovered from the gunshot wounds, and the tinny buzzing in my disfigured ear had lessened somewhat. I decided to treat myself a bit and cash in on my share of hot water for the next few days and shower right then. I wrapped a towel around my waist, left the changing room to store the discarded uniform, and headed toward the shower stalls.

I showered, relieved at the feeling of hot water as it rushed over my chilled body, and equally at losing the itchy feeling of griminess that characterized having rationed water supplies. As I stood beneath the stream, I dwelled on the blonde girl from the east side of Gotham, her identity tickling at the back of my brain, clamoring to be known.

It hit me spectacularly after a few minutes of thawing out beneath the warmth of the water.

Bette Kane. I could have smacked my head with the heel of my hand. _Helloooo, Dick._

 _God,_ how could it have taken me so long to remember her—all at once it seemed like it was barely the previous evening that I'd flipped her onto her front atop my kitchen table in my old apartment in Bludhaven and gone at it with her like we were a pair of rabbits on the night of my nineteenth birthday. (The good old days, when an active sex life didn't come with an astronomical price tag.) Was the night really so sable in tone, the light from the apartment so weak, the murk of ash choking the city air so intense? Maybe I needed to resign from Hood work, given that I was apparently so off my game that I became guilty of such a tremendous oversight.

Or… was it just that Bette herself had changed so much in the horrific wake of the Month of the Devil? There was a time once that she had walked with the regal air of the teen queen that she was, that she strolled comfortably amongst the upper crust elite of both Gotham and Bludhaven, bedecked in pearls and cashmere, that she exuded privilege and ease and confidence. It was one of the things that had, in my younger years, simultaneously intrigued and put me off about her—and made that all-night romp in my Bludhaven apartment so damn satisfying. That girl was _long_ gone, replaced now by the one that had stood scared and cagey on her stoop, half-in and half-out of her doorway, a thin, skittish thing in her mended, soiled clothing, her hair greasy and lank around her once fresh, glowing face. A specter, a shade, an apparition.

And here that ghost was, back in Gotham from Bludhaven, likely to reconvene with what family she had left in the upshot of the Horsemen. This new world was kind to no one. It spared none. Even the wealthy found themselves stripped of resources ordinarily open to them. Some made it away to Rann in the scant window that Savage allowed its gates to remain unblocked—countless more did not. And even those born to the most privilege found themselves shriveling away beneath the harshness of their new lives, whittled down to their bare bones. I leaned my head against the wall of the shower stall, a heaviness pressing down on my chest like the palms of some unseen goliath.

Sometimes, I could set myself adrift in this new life, sleepwalking through its horrors, a zombie to what was real. But, like every sleep, these somnambulant phases had to end—and moments like these, witnessing Bette as she stood scared and wasted on her stoop, the piles of dead bodies, all sizes, big _and_ small, left by enforcers, the creeping viruses that infested the city streets and plugged the hospitals with teems of sick, the startling rumors carried by fearful mouths of the depravity of the Marauders—they were those buckets of frigid water, snapping me cruelly back to the bitter reality of the world.

I heaved a sigh that I drew all the way from my empty belly, and tuned into the feeling of the steaming water as it beat against my shoulders. These extended water use rations. I'd hold onto this small pleasure as tightly as I could.

It was with a lot of regret that I finished up when the tap automatically disengaged. I dried off, rubbing my face against the towel—still soft—unabashedly, like a cat, and headed out of the stalls to raid my insignificant stash of clean clothes.

Dressed, I headed to my old room in the manor with Wolf, and hunkered down wearing all of my clothes under the heap of blankets in my bed, with my companion's big, hairy warmth next to me. I knew he missed Conner. And M'gann. And that I was a pathetic substitute for either of them.

Thinking on all my deceased loved ones, still coming off of the encounter in Gotham, I dwelled on Zatanna's father, grieving now for my friend and her own enormous loss. I hadn't been there to witness what had happened, since I was hanging out nigh comatose in the Bat Cave's med-lab, so I wasn't one hundred percent on the details, but I had gotten enough of the story from Bruce. Locked in battle over the helmet of Fate with Klarion, who gleefully sported some nasty new magical artifact of undetermined sources that gave him some serious oomph, Zatara and Zatanna both were overcome, the former defeated and mortally wounded, the helmet by some ghastly act of invasive sorcery wrested from him. Klarion fled with the helmet, leaving Zatara to die in his daughter's arms. From what I heard, though, Nabu rejected Klarion—something I couldn't help feeling some grim satisfaction over.

I sighed, staring at the inky black of the ceiling, the condensation of my breath on the cold air of the bedroom scarcely visible in the darkness. The silvery puffs shifted across my view of the ceiling as I lapsed steadily into sleep, siphoning down into a dark, murky slumber, full of meandering shadows. They blended into M'gann's face, melting gruesomely within the flames that engulfed her body as she screamed at me, her lips burned away to reveal blackened, grinning teeth.

 _You could have helped me, Dick, like you could have helped your parents, like you could have helped Wally, like you could have helped Tula—but you didn't, because you aren't the man you think you are—you're just a weak, pathetic child, you're a failure, a_ failure— _and you burn everything you touch—_

I was shaken awake sometime later, and started when I saw Zatanna standing beside me.

"What's wrong?" I hissed, shooting up in bed.

Wolf stretched out beside me, his hindquarters rising a bit, his tongue curling in his big jaws. He sank back down with a groan, settling his chin on his forelegs. At his calm, sleepy disposition, I relaxed—I had thought, upon waking and seeing Zatanna there, that Marauders were in the manor.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, visibly shivering. I saw the outline of a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. "I really didn't want to wake you up. I just…"

I tilted my head as she hesitated, struggling to see her better in the dark. "What's going on?"

She shifted her weight. "Can I, uh… You think I could climb in there with you?" I heard her teeth chattering.

"Yeah, sure." I sat up, tangled in the heap of blankets, the images of that awful nightmare still fresh in my mind's eye, slowing my movements. I nudged Wolf a little, and he shifted away from the center of the bed. "Can't sleep?"

Zatanna was quiet a moment. "…Sort of."

I took a breath, my heart down pacing now to a normal step within my chest. Ice frosted the window, perceptible even in the darkness. "Cold?" I hazarded, scooting over to free up some space for her.

"Oh, _freezing,"_ she said.

I chuckled a bit, now fully settled down from my initial concern, and lifted the covers for her. It _was_ damn cold.

"Can't have that," I told her. "Hop aboard, mate."

"Oh my god, _thank you."_

She clambered eagerly under the blankets, and then, curling up on her left, pressed her back to my chest. I encircled her shivering, frore, slender body with both arms, and Wolf rolled to his side, his back against mine. Even if she was chilled to the touch, though, I had a feeling there was more to this night call than just a prayer for a warm-up. I could feel her heartbeat spitting at the rapid tempo of a snare drum, even through her back.

I waited a second, and then asked, "So… want to tell me what's up?"

She was quiet a moment, her body warming against me under the blankets, her heart gradually decelerating in its frantic run.

"Bad dream," she said finally.

I figured. "Mmm. Want to tell me about it?"

She was silent for a moment or two.

"…It was about my dad," she said into the quiet of the room.

"Oh." I tightened my hold on her. "…I'm sorry, Zatanna."

She didn't speak for a while, just drew her arms up and clasped mine.

Eventually, she shook her head, and unexpectedly started to laugh. "Ugh, Dick—I am _so_ sorry I woke you up over this…"

Disarmed, I joined in her mirth. "Oh, don't be, it's okay," I said. "Trust me, I'm not judging."

"Oh, please, you probablyy should. I mean, come on—how _old_ am I? One bad dream and I go running off to the nearest person like I'm five." She took a breath, still giggling a bit. "Jeez. Some bravery…"

I gave her a reassuring squeeze. "Zatanna, seriously, it's okay. …I have them, too."

She tapered off, and turned over to draw an arm up across my back. "Oh, Dick, I'm sorry," she murmured. "Bad?"

"Bad enough that I've wanted to go run to the nearest person myself a time or ten."

She tightened her hold on me, her hand spread across my shoulder blade. "Well… I understand that one." She chuckled. "Obviously. It all makes Freddie Krueger look like Mister Rogers."

"Amen," I said.

I soft-pedaled, thinking on how this conversation came about. "…I'm sorry about your dad, Zatanna," I said.

She was quiet, sobering as well, and then said, "It's… okay. I mean… it _will_ be okay. I think." She shifted a little. "You know… Even though he didn't make it…" She paused, turning to her back under my arm and gazing up at the ceiling awash in shadows, "There's a part of me that's just so glad I got to talk to him one last time, even if it was only for a minute." She sighed. "I know that sounds kind of… I don't know. But…" Her voice trailed off.

"Well. I remember you saying once that you'd give your soul for that," I told her, "and that you were totally comfortable making that statement because you figured it was the only way you would ever truly get to see your father again." I shuffled my arm, laid a hand on hers. "I know how much you loved your dad. I _really_ wish it didn't end like that for him. And for you. But… I'm glad you got to see him one last time, too." I laced my hand through her fingers. "And trust me—I know that was every bit as much a blessing for him."

She turned over, and pressed her face into my chest. I could feel her trembling—a telltale sign of stifled tears. I held her all the more tightly for it, resting my hand on the back of her head, her wavy hair soft as goose down under my palm.

"Thank you," she whispered, after a time. "Dick, I'm _so_ glad you're okay."

I kissed her forehead. "Same to you."

She sighed, and nestled closer still.

I slept fast that night, finally feeling truly warm and comfortable for the first time in weeks, all cuddled between Zatanna and Wolf.

That first night started a habit of co-sleeping for the three of us, usually in my bed, sometimes in the one Zatanna had claimed as hers in the manor. The few nights we slept apart, we noticed, she about froze into an iceberg and lay chattering miserably without ever dozing off, and we both had nightmares that soundly obliterated any attempt to sleep. So we usually ended up sleeping all bundled together in the same bed. No nightmares, no icy phalanges. Wolf well cared for with Conner gone. Pretty much perfect symbiosis.

However, I'll admit a part of me _did_ worry that Barbara's ghost was going to show up in the manor and raise holy hell all poltergeist style for me sharing a bed with another girl, and an ex-girlfriend, no less.

But, when everything remained quiet, I slept curled up next to Zatanna, with Wolf at my back or hers, every night for weeks.

 _Savage burned the black markets of Gotham into rubble._

 _And executed the regional administrator alongside a throng of Sam sympathizers._

 _So we stalled on leaving graffiti, opting instead to keep a lower profile to protect the people of the city by focusing solely on the dispensation of extra supplies. We didn't interfere directly with the Marauders or enforcers anymore._

 _Some protection, Luthor._

 _Smaller scale black markets popped up like a proliferation of creeping flox among the suburbs surrounding Gotham. Always shifting positions. Indicating their next intended site through coded messages. We sourced goods from them._

 _Our missions reduced to once every two weeks or so. A different day each time. Coded messages sent out to recognized, trusted sympathizers to know when to expect us. Just like our black market friends._

 _Hospitals increasingly strained, underfunded, overcrowded. Continually under investigation by the Light's enforcers._

" _It's like Gestapo-inspired health insurance," Jason muttered. "Got some pre-existing condition? We got you covered. Pax, fucker." He mimicked firing a gun._

 _So Alfred, with all the sprightliness of a man forty years his junior, joined us on our forays into Gotham's streets, given that he was handy with medicine. Enabling people to avoid the hellholes that were the city's hospitals._

 _At that time, it was just Bruce. Zatanna. Jason. Wolf. Alfred. Myself._

 _A small resistance at best. "Extremely strained relief effort" might be more fitting a term._

 _But. All of it better than nothing._

Returning to manor grounds after work on the streets one afternoon (a time of low activity from Light enforcers, given that they'd grown accustomed to our previously nocturnal habits), Bruce enlisted Zatanna and me to gather a good-ish amount of fallen branches from the woods to dry out for use as kindling. All of us spent most of the time huddled next to the fireplace in the den, given that even the increased amount of energy permitted our residence didn't account for its size, and there was a snowball's chance in hell that the manor could be heated effectively with the ration granted. Space heaters in the rooms we used did little good, since they were quite the energy-suck, including the "efficient" ones, and the rooms were too damn big to heat, anyway, even with five of them roaring at once (which always prompted an immediate black-out and cued all of the incumbent frozen misery.) Good thing the mansion sat in the middle of the woods—with all the trees dead and dying, there was plenty of firewood to go around.

"I don't know if you've gone over this with Bruce yet, but what have you turned up on this weird 'Purge' group?" asked Zatanna, dumping an armload of damp branches into the barrow.

I shook my head, copying her actions with my own burden. "Oh, from what I've gathered they're just a bunch of nutjobs who apparently think Savage is the Antichrist and the Horsemen were… ah, well, just that, the Horsemen from _Revelation_. By all accounts they're not really religiously motivated, just valiantly trying to protect the earth from the endtimes." I straightened, stretching out a sore muscle in my back, and went back to it. "I was able to have their network access a phishing site I set up, and from there I gathered the IP address to compromise their routers, but… so far nothing to report. Just a bunch of former cops and ex-military and would-be vigilantes shooting off some Big Talk about plans to give Savage the Punisher treatment and all that. Now—they _claim_ to have been the ones who bombed the hell out of the Lazarus pits and murdered the al Ghuls, but that seems pretty… um… _professional?_ Of them? Unless they hired somebody to get the job done, which is really freaking unlikely. They're small and underfunded at this point."

"Are they sympathizers?" she asked.

"No," I said. "Definitely not sympathizers. Apparently they've marked us, too, seeing as how, you know, all of this was our fault. It's about the one thing they agree with Savage on."

She grimaced. "So… _another_ organized group that doesn't like Leaguers. Super."

"Yep. Super."

"You know, I can't help but notice the irony in their maintained belief that Savage is the Antichrist, and yet they still take his claims as law and blame us for the Horsemen," she said with a humorless half-laugh.

"Well. Maybe it _was_ something we did," I said unhappily. "I mean… who really knows. We've made a lot of enemies over the years."

"Okay, sure, but that aside, no one saw them coming, Dick," she said. "I mean, _no one_ saw them coming. So we don't know if they were… maybe similar to the 'Eater of Worlds' figures, you know, like they fed off the planet's energies, or something like that… or if they were just like a spaceshipload of rebellious teenagers who, for all we know, are all in alien juvie now for arson and destruction of property while their parents all weep for shame." She shuffled at the pile of wood in the barrow, balancing it. "Or if the invasion was an organized hit in response to something we did, or…" She paused. "…Or maybe I just don't want to think about it too much." She made a pained expression. "Ignorance is bliss."

"Life's more painless for the brainless," I agreed. "At some point, though, we'll have to determine, _definitively_ , why the Horsemen targeted the earth." I sighed, and rubbed the achy spot in my chest through the armored padding. "But, until then… We've got plenty to deal with, so I guess we'd better focus on that first."

"Right, but… Actually, come to think of it, finding the source of this mess might help us fix things. Or be the telling factor in whether it's _ever_ fixed."

"Now _that's_ a crappy thought."

"Oh, _please_ don't be toochalant about this one," she said, with a smile. "We're counting on those keen detective skills, you know."

"Count on Bruce's," I returned lightly. "And _you_ don't be too whelmed, here."

Her smile grew into a grin. "This doesn't sound like the Boy Wonder detective I remember… Is it that hard to stayed whelmed and optimistic in times like these?"

I grinned back. "Duh. Anyway, it's not like we haven't tried to figure who the Horsemen are, and why they came here."

"That's more like it. Any leads?"

I shook my head. "None that have panned out."

"What about Superman?"

"Equally nothing doing. Our biggest worry is that the Light has him. But given the limited resources, it's hard to know that for sure… I mean, they might have put him to death, like they planned on doing, or they might have sold him to an enemy, or they're holding him captive for God knows why. I've been trying to pick through their network traffic without triggering any intrusion detection systems, but that's tough going at best."

"…Damn."

"Them's the breaks in this world," I muttered, by then limping as we made our way to the storage room adjoined to the back of the manor. The slow, steady dropping of sleet that had persisted since that morning had turned into a dingy, quiet snowfall, sprinkling the lawn with patches of ashy white. There was an alien characteristic of peace in the scene, in spite of the deformed, unprepossessing landscape. The snow covered the sodden detritus of the garden in a soft blanket of dove feather gray, as though some kindly god of the sky laid its moldering remains to rest with a promise of sun to come upon its waking.

We stacked the bundles of wood against the back wall of the storage room to dry, and rather than track the soot, mud and snow into the manor to access the Bat Cave so we could unsuit, we headed back outside to use its entrance in the woods.

 _God,_ my leg hurt. Six or seven months and it still clamored its displeasure in the wretched cold. I hobbled to the showers after ditching the suit, using the walls as crutches, focused only on making it to the nearest stall. My calf screamed bloody murder that echoed through my thigh up to my abdomen and down through my heels. I clenched my teeth and limped over the cold, tile floor that led to the showers.

Zatanna rounded the corner, and immediately headed in my direction when she noticed me struggling. She was wrapped in a towel, her long, dark hair wet, and the air around her heady with the scent of the soap she used.

"You okay?" she asked.

"Oh, yeah, I'm good," I told her tightly. "Leg just hurts like all hell where my bone got half-disintegrated, no big deal."

She snorted, and then let me brace a little of my weight on her as she assisted me to the shower stall. I held my own towel up with my free hand. I became suddenly very, very aware of how _good_ she smelled and the feeling of her body, barely covered, close to mine.

I resolutely did not look at her as I thanked her through gritted teeth, and showered uncomfortably, feeling suddenly a bit unsettled, when she headed for the changing rooms. I wrapped up the shower before the ration was spent, toweled off, and left to get dressed, wondering at the strange, murky fog of confusion that had meandered into and filled up my brain. A throng of inarticulate thoughts and feelings, instinctively familiar, but as yet immaterial, writhed somewhere inside of that fog, a horde of beasts whose presence was known, but unseen.

I caught up to Zatanna in the corridor that led to the entryway that opened into the den. The distraction that talking provided at least proved something of a deterrent against the shapeless thoughts I wasn't sure I was ready to see corporealize, and we walked out of the cave together, closing off the entrance behind us by use of the notch in the wall.

A fire still burned under the mantle, although no one else was in sight. With some gratitude, I fell onto the couch, and pulled a throw blanket across my lap. She joined me, not far off, and reclined on her back with her feet pressed against my thigh, under the throw. I could feel how cold her bare feet were even through the fabric of my jeans, and, unhesitating given our closeness, I caught one of her chilled feet and circled my thumbs under the arch, massaging it. I found, to a sense of profound disorientation, that I felt a little strange, rubbing Zatanna's feet. It wasn't like this was unusual for us, or any of my other friends of the opposite sex, even before Barbara had died—to me, touch by itself has never been synonymous with _intimacy_ , and I'm touchy-feely with all my loved ones, so giving Zatanna a foot rub seeming suddenly all out of place left me a bit puzzled.

Still. It felt good.

We ended up spending a long time talking about all manner of topics, ones that may have once seemed perfectly commonplace, but held a quality of foreign cheer in the dank, festering dimness of the once-inviting den. Jason entered and chatted with us for a bit, and then abruptly stood up and left. I askance watched him go, but didn't worry about his sudden, awkward departure beyond some momentary wondering.

Some hours went by, although I can't say how many. We continued talking. Zatanna recalled horseback-riding with her dad in the summers they spent in the Italian countryside, her first Communion and how she had loved her frilly, white frock that she spun in until she was so dizzy she tripped over the hem of the skirt and ripped it, her first mission with the team and the way she thought it was just about the cutest thing ever when I leapt, totally undignified, to greet her. I smiled at this last divulgence, and mentioned to her that I had thought the same thing of her when I first saw her enter the cave at Happy Harbor (and, as she knew, failed to hide as much.)

There was silence, and I wondered if I'd said something wrong. She had shuffled closer to me in the cold left by the dying fire by that time, her legs stretched across my lap, her head on my shoulder. She looked at me, her expression unreadable, her eyes a deep, gunmetal blue in the smoky half-light of the den. My eyes unwittingly strayed to the elongated cupid's bow of her lips.

 _Now is not the time for this,_ I thought, trying to force a cooler head to prevail. _Not now, or ever._

I was about to gracefully shuffle out from under her to head to my room, where I planned on shamelessly spanking it while thinking about Barbara, and how much I missed her, and still hadn't accepted that she was dead—and in so doing, keep things unrisky, uncomplicated, and comfortable with Zatanna.

Before I could move, however, she said, "Dick."

I looked at her, and I don't think I could have moved if I'd wanted to—and I didn't. I recognized the expression she wore immediately. It set my heart off at full speed like a spooked horse.

A smile spread over her features, and she adoped an affected voice. "…'My love is as a fever, longing still, for that which longer nurseth the disease…'"

I made a face at her. Her expression aside, I couldn't tell if she was goofing around after talking about past feelings, or if this quotation was meant to be something serious. "…Are you quoting Shakespeare at me?"

She grinned. "Yes, Boy Wonder—I am. It _fits._ "

I became aware of her hand on my shoulder, its pressure light and barely there, but enough to turn a good portion of my attention to it. I was quiet as her words sank in. I was a little familiar with Shakespeare's sonnets, given that I'd read them for class in high school. I obviously couldn't just rattle this particular one off verbatim, but I knew the gist. Unrequited love for someone who brought you pain, and yet the love continued regardless.

"Dick," she said, abruptly sobering, "I never stopped loving you."

I remained quiet. This truth, even though it really shouldn't have been all that big of a shock, considering that at least some part of my brain was well aware that she still nursed a soft spot for me, hit me like a blast of lightning, and a feeling of further disorientation came over me.

I had assumed I'd wind up with Barbara until the ages-old death did us part. And, I realized with a tremendous pang, it had. This hurt. A lot. But I was still alive. And so was Zatanna. Who had blatantly just admitted to having feelings— _real_ feelings—for me, even after all of the years had passed.

(And yes, a big part of me openly cheered over it.)

She looked miserable, I saw, in the wake of my silence, and she moved to extricate herself. I caught her, staying her motions, and, since I didn't really have any reasonable words to express how I felt without sounding like a complete idiot, I just leaned down and kissed her.

I half-expected her to pull away—as I'd thought already, this was not the time, or place, for such things. But she rose up to meet me, and opened her mouth with some abandon, her hands locking in my hair. I felt the tug of her teeth on my lip, gentle, but insistent, as she readily angled to her back, pulling me down with her. Her hands tugged at my hair, ran down my shoulders, snaked under the fabric of my shirt, pressed on my back. I fought with her top, seeking her breasts, soft handfuls, punctuated by the firmness of her chest beneath. She lifted up under me, her hands now grasping me by the bare skin of my hips, sneaking under the waist of my jeans.

"Dick," she breathed between kisses, "I love you. I love you. I love love love love you."

My lips moved to her throat, the smooth expanse of her breastbone, hampered by her clothing. I yanked her shirt up and unceremoniously chucked it somewhere across the room. I encountered some issues with her bra, which was a multi-hooked thing meant more for function than form. With a laugh, she lent me some assistance, and undid the hooks and eyes to grant me access to what I pursued. I rose up, running my hands over her breasts, arrested by her form in the glow of the fire. _God,_ she was gorgeous. I leaned down, inhaling the scent of her chest, drawing an areola into my lips. She arched her back into my touch, pulling at the fetters of my own clothing, dragging the shirt over my head, fumbling at the waist of my jeans, and this continued thusly, on down the line, until all of the clothes were in haphazard, scattered piles on the floor. I had a disquieting thought that one of our housemates might happen upon us as we cavorted in the den, but sneaking buck-naked to a bedroom seemed like it was probably a riskier business than just staying put. That aside, while I might have battled for a cooler head earlier, I'd officially forked the wheel over to its hotter counterpart, and it was in complete control—especially now that Zatanna had grasped my erection and was roving her grip over it.

For as much as I wanted her to continue, I knew it would be over in short order if I allowed her to, seeing as I was fairly out of practice at that point. I drew back a ways until she released me. I kissed a line down the rapidly warming surface of her skin over her abdomen, past her navel, until I reached the cleft at her thighs. I felt her jerk a little, but her hips rose, and a low sound escaped her throat as I targeted all the spots to make her sing grand opera. Her voice rose in timbre, her hands worked violently in my hair, and then, finally, her body locked itself into a fixed, trembling, yogic bridge. I sensed every contraction as she shivered, and then moaned softly, her back slowly relaxing, her hips sinking. She twitched, sighed, turned her face into the carpet beneath her. I was so hard I was in _agony._

I climbed over her, then, and closed my mouth on hers, her lips warm and pliant. Her knees lowered, butterfly's wings that opened by way of invitation, as I slid up her body, and _in_. I expelled a breath, then pulled another in and held it, overwhelmed for a moment when she closed tight around me like a hot, narrow fauces.

I lost all restraint and just about every tie to reality from the first movement. I was conscious only of feeling Zatanna's form under mine as she rocked in tandem with me, her hands spread over my back, sweeping trails of sweat over my skin, then locking under my arms to grip my shoulders. Her neck was feverous under my lips, her hair damp and sticky against my face, her fingers sharp andpressing hard into my flesh. I quickened my rhythm, feeling the burning in my body culminating, straining, fighting to burst, until I reached the maddening point just at the edge.

I made to withdraw, seconds away, but Zatanna's hands shot down to grasp my buttocks, her thighs strangulating at my hips, stalling me.

"Please," she murmured into my ear, "please."

I couldn't refuse that, and didn't want to, anyway.

I went in deep, and felt the dam break gloriously right in that instant. My ears popped, my entire body pulled itself taut even as it hitched and shook, and my vision funneled down into the blackness of space, broken up by flickering spots of light. I didn't even notice that I'd been inarticulately vocalizing praises to God until I became aware of the absence of the sound. With a sense of rushing water that flowed out from my appendages, and took my strength with it, my body went numb and weak. I sank down, stars still twinkling in my slowly clearing vision.

God, I'd never had an orgasm that practically set off fireworks before. Ever. Granted, I'd also never pulled the goalie on a girl before. Big firsts are big firsts.

I eased some of my weight off of Zatanna, and lay catching my breath beside her, one arm slung across her chest.

Damn, I needed that.

Some time passed, the only sound in the room that of our breathing. I could feel the sweat on my back cooling in the pervasive chill.

Finally, I reached over to finger a lock of her hair, and smiled at her as she looked over at me.

"…I love love love love you, too, by the way," I said, tracing the contour of her cheek with my thumb.

She returned my smile, and as I moved to kiss her then, I realized that what I said was the truth, although I was clueless as to how it was even possible. I felt, somehow, that I should have experienced some serious regret, and that I had in some way betrayed Barbara's memory, but much like sharing a bed with Zatanna, I didn't feel anything of the sort.

That didn't stop me crying uncontrollably while I lay in bed later, with Zatanna beside me, as I thought about Barbara. Again, though, I didn't cry because I was ashamed. There _was_ no guilt. Even though I felt that there should have been at least _some_ remorse, regret over making love to Zatanna wasn't the culprit behind the waterworks.

It had finally begun to sink in that Barbara was gone. As in done deal gone, never coming back gone. I realized, lying there with the tears streaming unchecked over my cheeks and temples, that I had cried for all of our late loved ones, but not much for Babs, since the world had shifted.

Since I first came to in the med-lab, some lavish portion of me had still expected to hear her voice echoing through the Bat Cave as she expounded at Bruce about something, or sought me out to push my buttons in some way and get us both chuckling over it. But that part of me had at last yielded beneath the truth, and I found I no longer waited to hear a voice that had long since been cut silent.

I turned onto my side, with my back to Zatanna, and just sobbed, until it escalated to such a decibel that it woke her up. Her concern on finding me that way quickly grew frantic, and she asked me repeatedly what was wrong, but I couldn't even bring myself to turn over and face her. After a time, she ceased to press me, and just laid a hand on my arm. It's common enough for people to cry after sex for a load of reasons. And to be honest, I'm sure she knew why I did, although she never said it.

Zatanna wordlessly kept that hand on my shoulder, running her other over my hair, until I'd finally cried myself out. I gripped her hand, clutching it as though it was my safety rope, and if I'd had any water left in me when I was done, I'd have been completely staggered. Drained, I sagged into the wet pillowcase, and dropped way off, Zatanna's arm encasing my chest from behind, holding all of my parts together just as she had since I was brought to the manor.


End file.
